Ripples
by Super Sheba
Summary: Because even the tiniest ripple can change a life. Drabble 03 This Love- Because in his eyes, there is not a thing wrong with her. RikuxMui
1. Power of Music

**Drabble #01- Power of Music**

_Characters: HajixSaya_

He does not know, but she can hear him from within the depths of her cocoon. She is silent and still. She cannot move. But she can feel him. She can hear him. It sometimes seems as though she is unbearably close to being able to touch him, but he is always just outside her reach.

He is always silent, never uttering a word as he sits in her tomb at night, just as he would sit wordlessly in the corner of her room on an uncomfortable chair each night, waiting for her to awaken to the new day.

But he does not need to speak. Whenever his fingers press gently against the fingerboard of his cello as he gracefully glides the bow across the strings, she can hear him. His playing is the bridge to the emotions that he keeps trapped within himself. Some days his Bach holds a more melancholy tone than usually, and other days his Mozart seems lighter than what is the standard.

For them, words are completely unnecessary. She cannot speak, and he needs not speak.

Somehow, he always knows when she is listening. He will play a piece that tickles her fancy, one that she has always loved to hear him play, and from time to time he will play that piece she taught him in an exaggerated fashion, as if to remind her that he long ago passed her in skill.

She cannot laugh, but he feels the same warmth then that he did in the days when she was awake. As he plays, he can see her soft smile and twinkling eyes each time he allows his lids to drift close. His thoughts vanish as the music and her smile become one, leaving his heart to beat a bit faster.

She cannot see him, but he is smiling slightly as he imagines her delicate fingers ghosting across his skin, grasping at his wrist tenderly but not without excitement.

As he plays, he remembers the first time he held the cello and bow in his hands, and how her touch left his skin warm and flushed. At that time, he had been nothing but a boy, but her touch sent warm waves throughout his entire being.

And he wishes that once again he could feel her arms around him, her hands placed atop his, just as they had been when he had first drawn the bow across the strings.

She longs to burst from her cocoon and run her fingers through his dark locks, his name spilling from her lips in a breathless whisper.

"_Haji."_

He pulls the bow across the strings slowly, allowing the vibrato-filled note to drift through the air for a long moment.

To her, it is as though he is calling her name with yearning.

"_Saya_."

And as his cello begins to sing in a saddened tone, she knows that he misses her as much as she does him.

They are close. Maddeningly close.

And from behind drooping lids, their hands meet, fingers intertwining tightly.

He does not know that she can hear him.

She does not know that he can feel her every emotion.

And so they reach out for one another passionately, not realizing that words are completely superfluous the moment he draws his bow across the strings.

They do not know it, but the music speaks with much more depth than their words ever can.


	2. Shit Happens

**Drabble #02- Shit Happens**

_Characters: OkamuraxMao_

Sometimes she has difficulty choosing between slapping him silly and kissing him senseless. She has never met a more frustrating, headstrong man. He is crude, always tries to sneak a smoke, and is easily blinded by ambition, and yet she has him wrapped around her finger.

He comes home from work cranky and reaches into the fridge for a cold beer. She comes up behind him and breathes a puff of air at his ear. His whole body stiffens and she manages to snake her arms around him. The beer falls to the floor forgotten, and she manages to snatch the package of cigarettes that he has been hiding in his pocket. He is aware of this in the back of his mind, but the sensation of her lips kissing seductive lines up his jaw have him forgetting that he ever wanted to smoke.

She is quick and deadly, always capturing him as a lioness captures her prey. One moment he is going to go out for a night on the town, and the next he finds himself in bed, their clothes strewn across the floor and her slight form curled into him in a light sleep.

"Mao."

Her name still feels foreign on his tongue, even after all of this time, because what was once uttered with annoyance and irritation is now spoken tenderly with affection. He can feel her fingers brushing gently against the light brown stubble littering his face.

"You need to shave." She always tells him.

"I will." He always promises her.

Neither of them is serious.

She likes the prickly feeling against her lips as she kisses him good-bye in the mornings before she heads off to work. She likes the way the stubble reveals his relaxed, devil-may-care attitude.

He likes the sensation of her fingertips playing lightly across his skin. He likes the smile upon her lips as she kisses him.

He often wonders how someone as free and ambitious as he had managed to become entrapped in the web of a woman just as ambitious.

She often wonders how this man turns into a purring kitten when she is wrapped within his embrace.

And they both wonder how someone so obsessed with one man could fall so deeply in love with another man with such a different character.

But as they sit next to each other on the couch of their small New York City apartment, gazing at photographs of the old yellow car that they had adventured in during their days in France, his hand resting warmly atop the slight bump in her belly, neither regrets what has happened.

He has always been a firm believer in the expression "shit happens." Life is unexpected, he reasons, and you cannot do anything to change it. However, gazing at the warm glow emanating from his wife, he can't help but to also reason that "shit" might not be so bad after all.


	3. This Love

**Drabble #03- This Love**

_Characters: RikuxMui_

Whenever he walks down the street, his hand in hers, they receive quizzical and doubtful stares.

He is a beautiful boy, flawless in appearance, the face of an angel.

She is battered and dirty. There is a stub where a leg once was, and she cannot move without the help of crutches.

But beneath her humble exterior is a lovely girl filled with talent. She plays the piano with skill, and her smile is absolutely infectious. She can bring a group of fighting youngsters together and help them to form a deep friendship.

While she sits on the sidelines as the children play baseball, she cheers with a sincere heart, even though she wishes from the bottom of her heart that she could play.

She is human, and she certainly does envy the other children who have not lost any limbs. Sometimes she cries at night in frustration as she remembers the days when she could run and jump with all of the other children.

But she never resents them, even as her condition worsens.

Those who do not understand Mui believe Riku to pity her as he strolls down the streets with her and accompanies her wherever she goes.

He can see past her disability. He can see all of the things she can do that others cannot simply because she has lost one leg.

When children come to the orphanage with injuries, she cares for them tenderly, letting them sob in her arms. She does not even complain when the children who come without injury arrive screaming. Because she knows that they are scared and have no parents. She remembers the pain of losing her precious older brother, and cannot imagine the pain of losing her parents.

At night, when Mui is tossing and turning in her sleep, reliving the nightmare of the mine explosion that took her leg, Riku dabs at the sweat on her brow and sits beside her until her breathing again becomes steady and her sleep is again peaceful.

Mui never knows of Riku's nights at her side, but she knows that he is a true friend. He does not care that she only has one leg. He does not care that her family is poor and that she no longer has an older brother. He does not pity her or curse her fate, wishing that she were "normal." Naturally he wishes that she could play with all of the other children and live happily as they do, but these thoughts do not revolve around her missing leg. It is a heart-felt desire for her to be happy, with or without her second leg.

When they go shopping in town, a woman wonders why such a cute little boy is walking around with "damaged goods." She asks him why he is playing with _that_ girl who only has one leg, not caring that Mui is standing right beside him and can hear her scathing words.

He merely turns to the woman and replies, "Huh, what're you talking about?"

They walk away, elbows linked while Mui giggles hysterically at the look of bewilderment on the woman's face.


End file.
